[HD] Franchise fees??? For What???

I have Comcast HD and new lines run to my house in Northern IL and channel 7 and 9 and a few others pixel to the point that I can't even watch these channels? Seems to me that the infrastrucure is not up to date. They just keep charging us fees and raising the cost of cable. Such a ripoff!

Franchise fees pay for government, educational, and public access channels. They also pay for the ability to put programming on those channels and services for schools and public buildings

....and are required to be collected and passed along to your local franchise authority (municipality, town, village, city, hamlet, state). It's like a local tax. Your franchise authority should be listed on your monthly bill. They can tell you what they do with that money.

Franchise fees go to your local government and pays for coffee and such. In some cases it pays for your mayors grandaughter to paint the fire hydrents. Comcast has no control of what they spend it on. Comcast just passes the money on to them.

mikedz4 is not correct- the others are. Franchise fees are actually a local, stealth tax that the franchising authority (your local government) forces Comcast to collect on their behalf. It is simply a tax, and can be used in whatever way the local government wants to. Clever, isn't it? You get taxed and don't even know it. It's not labeled as a tax, and the official tax collector doesn't collect it.

I have Comcast HD and new lines run to my house in Northern IL and channel 7 and 9 and a few others pixel to the point that I can't even watch these channels? Seems to me that the infrastrucure is not up to date. They just keep charging us fees and raising the cost of cable. Such a ripoff!

If by "7 and 9" you refer to local stations, then comcast is getting pixelated feeds from them and passing them on to you.--My place : »www.schettino.us

No comcast doesnt charge a franchise fee to offset any costs. !00 percent of the fee get passed on to your local government. What your local government does with it is up to them and is in no way under the control of comcast. In my case there isnt any local peg channels and the funds go into whatever the local government wants it to go into. In no case does comcast control any of the franchise fees. Its 100 percent your local governments money to do with what ever they decide. thats the way it is in the USA. Not a 1 example where comcast gets even one red cent of that fee. A franchise fee is nothing but a rental fee to use the local ROWS.